Molasses
by Vera Steine
Summary: It was just a moment in time, but it made a lot clear. Jack/Ianto, post-Exit Wounds.


Rating: T (PG-13)  
Disclaimer: they are not mine, I intend no infringement. They belong to the BBC. The lyrics that inspired the title are from "Northern Lad" by Tori Amos, from her album, "From the Choir Girl Hotel".  
Spoilers: Exit Wounds, Cyberwoman (tiny)  
A/N: with gratitude to kel_reiley, for the wonderful beta, to kilawater for letting me rant and reading it for me, to used_songs for the incredibly detailed answers to all my questions, the fabulous beta, and her thoughtful insights. And lastly, to the people at the TWU for weighing in with their thoughts.

--  
_First, he loved my accent  
Oh, how his knees could bend  
I thought we'd be okay, yeah  
Me and my molasses  
But I, I feel something is wrong  
--_

The shattering sound is a warning in itself, and Jack abandons his paperwork to follow it to its source. The kitchenette is cramped, dishes on the draining rack, yellow cleaning rag lying half on the counter, ready to slide off at a gust of air, the shards of a water glass spread across the tile floor. Ianto is crouching, in shirt sleeves, reaching out to pick them up. Then suddenly Jack's watching in slow motion: the way the glass slices through skin, the red that wells up and runs down in one single rivulet to fall as one, two, three droplets, soaked up by crushed glass on the floor.

"Shit."

He moves forward quickly, kneels by Ianto's side and tugs his hand towards him, turning the palm up so he can inspect the damage. Ianto's head comes up, his eyes meet Jack's; for a moment he thinks the surprise in them is still from the pain, then he realises Ianto wasn't aware he was there. "Let me see," he says needlessly, and even more unnecessarily he waits for a nod of consent before looking at the damaged hand. It's a clean cut, a diagonal laceration through the lifelines on Ianto's skin, blood welling up to pool in the palm of Ianto's hand. He can see the flap of skin sliced by the shard; stitches will be needed to close the cut.

He meets Ianto's eyes again, and is not surprised to see tears in them; he knows this pain, the sort of bright burn a cut from a clear surface evokes. Unconsciously he runs his finger along the side of Ianto's hand down to his little finger, and feels a shudder from the body before him. They sit, crouched, on the kitchen floor, staring at each other, neither saying more or moving away. At last it's Ianto who breaks the silence.

"I cut myself."

Jack blinks, at the incongruity of the words and because he might not have heard it right. Ianto smiles faintly and adds, sounding only one step away from cheerful, "It hurts."

Ianto is looking at him, and he is still looking at Ianto, but Ianto's smile doesn't reach his eyes. Jack breaks the contact, and reaches up for paper towels which he presses into Ianto's palm. After assuring himself that Ianto is putting pressure to the wound, he lets go and helps them both to stand.

"I'll clean up here," he says, and now it's Ianto's turn to blink. It seems their roles have never been as ill-defined as they have been lately. "Go sit in the hub," he instructs. "You'll need a trip to casualty." After Owen died, he doesn't want to subject Ianto to his battlefield medical skills unless it's absolutely necessary.

Ianto leaves, taking with him that presence of strangeness, the molasses in Jack's bones. Jack moves quickly, sweeping up the glass and putting it in the rubbish bin, taking the fallen yellow rag and wiping the blood off the floor.

He goes out to find Ianto sitting on the hub sofa, his injured hand cradled to his chest, looking for all the world so calm that if it weren't for the blood soaking through the towels he could have just been waiting for Jack to take him out. Jack leaves him sitting there, detours to his office to slide into his coat and pick up Ianto's before going back. Ianto is standing by the door, having anticipated his move, and Jack places the black coat around his shoulders, hands lingering just a little. Then he turns the key and the door rolls back, and they make their way up to the Plass.

He doesn't know why they walk, but St Helen's isn't far, and soon they're sitting in the waiting area, plastic bucket chairs and NHS posters, and Jack is filling out the clipboard with Ianto's information so Ianto doesn't have to move his hands and get blood on his favourite suit. It astounds him how little he has to ask, how much he can fill in without even having to check; Ianto sits quietly by his side, studying the other waiting patients and their families. Jack leaves him a moment to hand the clipboard back to the duty nurse, asks how long it will take, and returns with an estimate of three hours. Ianto shrugs when he tells him, not seeming much disturbed, as disquietingly calm as always. Some days Jack wants to beat against that calm, find some way past the mask. Some days he knows he's already found it, in the small smiles, in the way Ianto quietly argues with his decisions, in the comfortable silences that can exist between them in bed.

Ianto's shoulder brushes against his as he shifts, Jack glances at him, meets his blue eyes. They both speak at the same time, both stop and Jack grins. "You first."

Ianto shakes his head. "It's not important. Just random."

Jack nods, after recent events, he understands the need to fill the silence. "Does it still hurt?"

A brief shake of the head, then Ianto adds, "No, not really. Just stings a little."

Jack leans in awkwardly and presses a kiss against the corner of Ianto's mouth. Just a brief point of contact, by the time Ianto turns his head to answer it, they've moved apart, and Ianto is looking at him from under his lashes.

"What was that for?"

Jack shrugs with one shoulder, mouth quirking. "I need a reason?"

Ianto shakes his head slowly, lips curling into a soft smile. "No. Just felt like you had one."

Jack laughs at that, and the realisation that Ianto knows him so well. "Maybe I had one." Belatedly, he adds what he knows inside. "I don't know."

Ianto's face tightens as he curls the fingers on his injured hand to keep the towels in place, and reaches with the other to put the back of his hand against Jack's cheek, mindful to keep the bloody palm turned away from Jack's face. It's an intimate gesture, one like so many they have shared lately. Jack leans his head just fractionally into the warmth, and tries to feel more alive. Ianto smiles again, sadly. He pulls his hand away to return it to its original position, slowly uncurling his fingers, and his face relaxes.

They sit in silence once more. It is after thirty minutes or so that the first patient from the waiting area is called through. An old lady, shuffling along with a young woman by her side, their exchanges in Welsh, the nurse reaching out an aiding hand that is batted away. Jack watches them go; feels Ianto shift slightly beside him as he does the same. No sooner is the woman gone than a mother comes in with a toddler in her arms, taking up the vacated seat. Jack has a vision of a conveyor belt, and pushes the maudlin thought away.

--

Forty five or so minutes more. A drunken young man with a cut above his eyebrow enters, too loud and swaying between two mates. The waiting area sighs in collective relief when a young medical student takes them through the double doors. The chair stays empty for exactly thirteen minutes -- not much else to do but look at the clock -- then a man in a chequered shirt takes the place, appearing uninjured but filling out a clipboard. He looks up briefly and scans the waiting room, eyes resting a little longer on Ianto, not Jack, suddenly making Jack aware of how unusual that is.

--

Twenty five minutes, and three people are waved through. A teenager wearing too much makeup, leaning on crutches, a pregnant couple, his arm around her waist, rubbing her back, soft words of encouragement in her ear as her hair brushes his shoulder, and the single man with the clipboard and chequered shirt, whose eyes still flick occasionally to Ianto, are waved through. Jack feels brief annoyance at his preference, and feels Ianto's shoulder once more rubbing against his own. He glances sideways to see Ianto's knowing smile.

--

After twenty four minutes more, Jack resolutely gives up on looking at the clock. He looks at Ianto instead, studying him from his peripheral vision, reaching out and laying a hand on Ianto's knee. Their eyes meet again; Ianto looks back tired but grateful, and Jack doesn't move his hand back.

--

A short time later and Ianto's name is called; they stand and follow. A quick inspection, local anaesthesia, and the medical student is making a neat row of stitches through Ianto's torn flesh while he looks away and bites his lip. Jack reminds himself to get a new medic.

Then he catches Ianto's eyes, just a little too bright, burning just a little too much. He goes over to where Ianto is sitting on the gurney; arm extended with the anonymous student working away. Jack raises a hand to Ianto's neck and rubs a soothing thumb through his hair. Ianto turns his head fractionally into the contact, Jack steps closer and lets him rest his head against Jack's abdomen. He hears it in Ianto's breathing, a soft sigh of relaxation, tension eased that was unspoken.

The student looks up, features wrinkling in bemusement as she watches them for a mere beat, then says, "There. All done, Mr Jones."

--

Then they stand outside in the night air with the unforgiving stars shining down on them. "Home or the hub?" Jack asks, and dreads the answer.

Ianto looks up from where he's studying his bandaged hand, looks at his uninjured one, and even in the glow of the strip lighting that shines out from behind the glass entry doors Jack can see the blood on it. He reaches out and takes that hand in both his own, running two fingers up Ianto's forearm, and watches as Ianto watches him.

"Jack?"

His fingers still, he meets Ianto's gaze, probing blue eyes.

"Home," Ianto answers his question. Jack tries not to let his shoulders fall in disappointment, not to let it show in his eyes. He doesn't know how long he stands there, still holding Ianto's hand, both of them motionless, their breath turning to fog in the night air.

"Come with me." It is spoken so softly, he's not sure Ianto meant for him to hear it. But he sees Ianto's eyes; the words are out there, the man before him does not back down, the bravery that Jack both admires and dreads. He lets go of Ianto's hand, brings both of his up to Ianto's face and cups it, pulling him in for a kiss that was supposed to be swift and short, but then softens and becomes passionate. He slides an arm around Ianto's waist and holds him close as they walk away from St Helen's, holding him as if Ianto _needs_ someone to lean on.

--

Ianto doesn't bother to turn on the lights at his flat; he closes the door behind Jack and moves past him through the dark into the bedroom to switch on the nightlights on either side of the bed. Jack takes off his coat and toes off his boots, leaving them by the door, then follows to find Ianto staring out through the blinds. He goes up and slides his arms around Ianto's waist from behind, leans his head on Ianto's shoulder, and knows what Ianto's seeing. "I miss them, too."

Ianto trembles, a motion almost undetectable, then leans back a little. "Everyone is so normal."

"That's why we do it."

Ianto nods, uninjured hand coming to rest over Jack's. "I love you, you know."

"I know." He knows, he's known, he hasn't wanted it, but he's known. It doesn't matter. He rests his head against Ianto's. "They knew, too."

For the first time in months, this causes Ianto to laugh. It isn't much, a chuckle, but the sound vibrates through Jack's body and feels good. "They did, yes."

There is a long silence between them, then Ianto adds, "She knew, too."

It doesn't take Jack long. "Lisa?"

Ianto nods again, silently. "At the end, when there was nothing left to say between us... She knew. She knew, and I'm not sure if it hurt her."

Jack freezes and stands quietly for a few moments, holding his lover in his arms, grateful that Ianto can't see his face. At last he rubs a few warm circles over Ianto's abdomen, presses a kiss against his temple. "Time for bed. Long overdue."

Ianto turns his head and kisses his chin, just short of his mouth. Jack leans into the contact. "What was that for?"

Ianto recognizes the comment for what it is. His smile is wider. "Because I can."

Jack lets him go and takes hold of Ianto's good hand, tugging him towards the bed. Jack wants to say something, wants to speak, but the words stay unfound. Ianto watches, shakes his head, then pulls his hand out of Jack's to run it over Jack's hair. There are always miles of wisdom and philosophy in the things they leave unsaid between them. Silently, they undress and go to bed.

--  
_finis_


End file.
